B&R remote on desktop?

[Fridolin]

Hi forum,

I intend to use Veeam B&R for a small Hyper-V-System in SMB environment. I would like to avoid installing anything onto host to keep it clean and simple. Is it possible to setup B&R on a client desktop and backup host and VMs remote? The clients that are used in this office are capable of doing a wakeup in the night, so it could be a nice scenario to have one of them wakeup at 11 h and do server backup. Will it work?

Best regards,
Fridolin

[Shestakov]

Hi Fridolin,
VBR server can be installed on any machine, including physical meeting the system requirements.

I would like to avoid installing anything onto host to keep it clean and simple.

Where do you want to keep your backups? Where do you want the data to be processed, on host or on off-Host Backup Proxy?

The clients that are used in this office are capable of doing a wakeup in the night, so it could be a nice scenario to have one of them wakeup at 11 h and do server backup. Will it work?

Could you specify what do you mean by "wake up"? Are you talking about sleeping mode on a desktop?
Thanks!

[Fridolin]

Hi Shestakov,

thanks for your contribution.

I guess my whish of having VBR run on distinct computer implies, that processing backup data should occur on this distinct system. But there is plenty of idle time in the night to use ressources on host and/or VMs for backup purposes. So if it's possible to have VBR on distinct system, but process data (via agent?) on server, it would be ok to me. The only thing I'm hesitating is to install software on the host.

There are two different storages for backups:

1. Some big an cheap disks built into the server, where host and VMs reside on and which are supposed to hold the backups of one week and to enable us to restore recent data quickly. Would be no problem to move these disks off the server to a distinct backup computer.

2. One RDX cartridge system for long term and offside storage of the media. This is an USB system, so it could be connected to the physical system where the host and the VMs reside on or it could be connected to a distinct Veeam Backup System.

Regarding your question about "wake up": The desktops I'm talking about are HP Pro desktops, which have the capability to wake up via BIOS.

My problem is that my knowledge about Hyper-V-Systems is theoretically, but quite good. Only the backup issue still is rather a black box: What to backup from where and to where, so that you're able to have brick level restores and system restores.

Thanks and best regards,
Fridolin

[PTide]

Hi,

So if it's possible to have VBR on distinct system, but process data (via agent?) on server<...>

Yes, it is possible. By default the proxy role is assigned to Hyper-V host so all processing takes place on host. Everything will be deployed automatically once you add your Hyper-V in a VBR console and will be run as service. Please note, that backup activity may result in high CPU and network usage during backup job run. If you have a spare machine with a Hyper-V role installed then you can use it as an off-host proxy thereby taking the workload from host to a separate machine. It is even possible to run everything on a single machine: off-host proxy, repo, backup server. The better but more expensive option would be to have a separate machine for each element.

What to backup from where and to where, so that you're able to have brick level restores and system restores.

You can have an on-host proxy and a separate machine for repo and backup server with RDX attached. Backups scheduled to run overnight will not impact production performance. Backups are stored on repo, copied during the day to RDX with a backup copy job with any retention period you need. Once a week your RDXs get transported offsite.

Also don't forget to check configuration backup option. Once properly adjusted it will let you to deploy a new VBR server very fast.

Thank you.

[Shestakov]

my 2 cents

But there is plenty of idle time in the night to use ressources on host and/or VMs for backup purposes.

You can keep using the host for processing, but define backup windows for your jobs, not to load the HV host during the business hours.
Thanks!

[Fridolin]

Hi PTide,

By default the proxy role is assigned to Hyper-V host so all processing...

I guess, it's the terminology, that I have to get used to. You say, if you install VBR directly on host - which seems to be the "normal" way of running VBR - then this host has a "proxy role"? That's why you talk about "on-host proxy" later? Ok, and installing VBR on a spare system is an off-host proxy then. But "backup server" then seems to be something else, right? Formerly with SMB (SBS) servers we had backup software on Server, which was file, print and backup server all in one, that was backing up on locally connected single tape drive. What is backup server in the Veeam world? If I have VBR running on host, then the host would be on-host proxy, if it runs on a spare machine, the host (not the spare machine!) is an off-host proxy. Then you have "repository", which are the disks or tapes, where backups are stored, right?

You can have an on-host proxy and a separate machine for repo and backup server with RDX attached. Backups scheduled to run overnight will not impact production performance. Backups are stored on repo, copied during the day to RDX with a backup copy job with any retention period you need. Once a week your RDXs get transported offsite.

So it could be like this: VBR is running on a Windows desktop as off-host proxy. VBR installs "light-weight"* components on the remote host, that has to be backed up. Both are connected over common gigabit office LAN. Storage (or repository) for the backups are the fat disks in the server, which are intended to hold short term backups, but it could be any NAS or the Windows desktop itself, right?

But I just discovered in this* article, that VBR running on a spare machine (off-host proxy solution) needs a Windows Server OS as underlying system. So if that is true, my intended solution does not work for my SMBs. I would have to setup VBR as on-host proxy. A compromise could be to invest in datacenter edition of Windows server so that I could have my two production VMs and a third VM running VBR only (plenty of idle time overnight, so heavy ressource allocation is no problem)?

Many questions, PTide, I hope they're not too stupid.

Thanks and best regards,
Fridolin

*http://helpcenter.veeam.com/backup/80/h ... proxy.html

[PTide]

Hi,

1. Backup server (VBR) - machine where VBR (Veeam Backup & Replication) is installed.

2. Proxy - host which processes data. Proxy software runs as a service. Host can be a proxy if and only if it has Hyper-V role installed.
2.1 On-host proxy: by default proxy role is assigned to the same host where your VMs reside. It's called an On-Host proxy.
2.2 Off-host proxy: proxy role can be assigned to a dedicated machine with hyper-v role installed. It's called an Off-Host proxy.

3. Repository - machine that stores backups. This role can be assigned almost to any machine, including Backup server. Please check the article for details.

A compromise could be to invest in datacenter edition of Windows server so that I could have my two production VMs and a third VM running VBR only (plenty of idle time overnight, so heavy ressource allocation is no problem)?

Correct, that's a valid solution to have VBR server running as a VM on the same host.

In your case you can have a desktop as a VBR + repo, and Hyper-V host serving as On-Host proxy. If you want to have an off-host proxy you need to have a machine with Hyper-V on it.

Thank you.

[Vitaliy S.]

Keep in mind that for off-host proxy server shared storage is required. If you're using local disks to store your VMs, then you will be able to use on-host proxy only, which is installed automatically once you add a Hyper-V host to the backup console.

[Fridolin]

Thanks, PTide, excellent explanation. Finally I got it.

@Vitaly

Keep in mind that for off-host proxy server shared storage is required.

Thanks to you too. With "shared storage" you are referring to the storage where VMs reside, not to the storage for repository, right? Yes, in my case everything resides within one physical machine: both RAIDS (the one for the VMs and the one for backups), the host and the VMs. Since "On-host proxy" seems to be what I'm looking for there should be no problem.

[Vitaliy S.]

Yes, in your case on-host proxy is a way to go. Yes, that's correct, shared storage is the place where VMs reside.